Ten Memorable Moments for the Tenth Anniversary of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
By Ani Bundel
With the tenth anniversary of the release of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire to theaters this week, we take a trip down memory lane and look back at the 2005 film.
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire stands to me as the moment when fantasy being a niche genre began to change. The book was released in the summer of 2000, less than a year before the first movie hit theaters. Pottermania was just beginning to take off, this was the first insanely crowded book store release date I remember being at. It was also the first of the “fat” Potter books to come out, and I had the bizarre experience of seeing people who had once made fun of me and my oversized Robert Jordan and George R.R. Martin tomes now carting about the same fantasy doorstoppers.
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The movie’s release five years later also seemed to usher in a second, much larger wave of Pottermania. There were several factors that fed into that over the intervening years, including Lord of the Rings sweeping the Oscars, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban being in all ways a very superior movie to the two very children focused Chris Columbus installments, and the release of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince (with that huge spoiler at the end of it) only a few months prior.
Goblet of Fire is the only one of the Potter cycle books to win a Hugo. The reason for that, I believe, is the same reason why we don’t call the Potter series a “cycle” very often, even though it’s the proper term for a seven installment series. Whereas in more proper cycles like Weiss and Hickman’s Death Gate, or George R.R. Martin’s A Song of Ice and Fire (assuming he finishes it) each book stands alone as well as part of the series, the Potter books have always felt like two trilogies with a stand alone book in the center as the fulcrum upon which they turned. The “thin” books compromise one trilogy, which ends when Harry learned of how his parents and family were betrayed, and that the adults around him were all involved. The second three “fat” books compromise the second trilogy of Harry’s fight against Voldemort and the bureaucracy that refuses to admit there’s a war coming. Goblet Of Fire is the fulcrum. It stands alone as neither part of the “thin” books, nor of the other “fat” books, a rollicking sporting competition adventure novel which both opens up the larger world of Wizards by introducing both French and Russian schools, as well as the larger world of the UK Wizards, with the introduction of characters like Rita Skeeter and Cornelius Fudge. It only makes sense then, that the move itself seems to stand alone from the others, both in terms of visual style choices, and directing.
Here, then, are ten of the most memorable moments from Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire.
10. The Big Floofy Hair Looks
This is the only movie where these looks were sported, and it’s a little jarring when watching them all back to back to see the looks go from “clean cut kids” to “long haired rebellious teens” and then back to “clean cut kids” in Order of the Phoenix. In fact, everything about the Goblet of Fire looks, from the rumpled student looks with the large collars and the untucked shirts is completely at odds with how the rest of the movies look. It makes this one stand out from the group as an oddity, a choice they began to go down, but then doubled back on. I’m sure Hermione was thankful anyway.
Next: Number 9: The Plot Changes
9. The Changes from The Books
Goblet of Fire was the first of the “fat” books to be brought to the screen, and because of that, it was the first one to have significant cuts made to it. There had been a few trims here and there on Azkaban, but in general it, like the Columbus movies before it, was basically faithful to the books. Goblet of Fire was far more ruthless, cutting Harry’s leaving Privet Drive all together, condensing the Quiddich World Cup significantly, rolling the Death Eater trials into one. The most egregious to fans though were the ones at the end, where Fudge’s refusal to believe Potter on the subject of Voldemort was cut all together (a huge set up for what was to come) as well as Hermione’s triumph over Rita Skeeter.
8. The Arrival of the Other Schools
We knew there was a Wizarding World beyond Hogwarts. But we never got to see it until the arrival of the other schools, especially the Beauxbatons showstopper entrance. Their uniforms come complete with perfectly crooked witch’s hats. It was the first major piece of world building beyond Harry’s lived experiences at Hogwarts and Diagon Alley. The Durmstrang Institute’s entrance sat as a complete counterpoint to it, suggesting that each culture has it’s own way of handling magic and training their wizards and witches.
7. Cornelius Fudge & Rita Skeeter
Along with the world outside the UK building came the first major experience with Wizarding World politics, as Harry meets Cornelius Fudge, the Minster of Magic, and the Wizarding World’s equivalent of the Prime Minister, as well as Rita Skeeter, a muckraking journalist. As Harry’s world expands as he grows up over the series, the role of politics, politicians and propaganda become very important. This was the beginning, and though the movie inexplicably cut the most important bits–Fudge’s refusal to accept Harry’s story of Voldemort’s return, lest it ruin his career, and Rita’s unmasking as an animangus–their arrival in Harry’s world are nonetheless key highlights of the movie.
6. The Introduction of the Pensieve
The introduction of the pensieve to the series is very important in several ways, as would be revealed in later movies. But in Goblet of Fire, it was our first entryway into the back storied past that we’d learned about in Azkaban. It allowed us to meet several death eaters, including Barty Crouch Jr. It also set up for Harry the reality of the world as Voldemort left it the first time, with ugly trials, and the discovery that people who were respected in the community had once ratted each other out to escape justice.
5. Harry’s Love Life
After three books where girls didn’t even factor into it, the introduction (on top of everything else that Harry is going through) to the dating scene, and the failure to get the girl was one of the truly memorable parts of Goblet of Fire. Whether it was seeing Cedric walk away with Cho, finding oneself at a dance with the wrong dates, or trying to figure out the ins and outs of formalwear, Goblet of Fire established a different kind of world building, one that was inward to the lived experience of growing up wizard, along with the outer world expansion.
4. Hermione’s entrance
I don’t care what color her dress was. Emma Watson nailed this moment for every nerd girl everywhere.
Next: Number 3: Madder than MadEye
3. Mad Eye Moody/Barty Crouch Jr
The huge reveal that MadEye Moody, who seemed to be this dangerous and rather baffling character, had never been MadEye Moody in the first place, but an impostor, was one of Goblet of Fire‘s biggest twists (outside of You-Know-Who arriving.) It was a twist that turned the “meddling kids” trope that had served the first three movies so well on its ear. They had suspected the right guy for the wrong reasons, only to discover that the real evil they were facing was far madder than any Moody could have been.
Next: Number 2: Cedric! Nooooo!
2. Cedric Dies
Cedric’s death was the first major good character Rowling killed off, and she did it in such an offhand style, I think George R.R. Martin would be proud. Cedric didn’t just die. He was tossed aside. A spare, a useless pawn, a life not worth Voldemort’s notice. It spoke volumes about the evil Harry was facing, as well as the difference between the two characters. To Harry, Cedric was almost larger than life, a person he looked up to, envied, and thought he could never compete with. And then his life was nothing, wasted, and all because he was generous to a fault and grabbed the Cup along with Harry.
Next: Number 1: He Who Must Not Be Named
1. Voldemort Returns
Could this list ever end any other way? After two books where the evil was being spirited through another person, and one where Voldemort was put aside for the closer to home betrayal of Peter Pettigrew, this was the moment where Evil finally arrived in the Wizarding world, and changed everything for Harry Potter forever. Ralph Fiennes was genuinely terrifying when we meet him here, finally in the flesh, and it’s only a small miracle that Potter was the one to make it out alive.
Next: Heyman Compares Fantastic Beasts To Goblet of Fire
What moments from Goblet of Fire stick out to you that we missed?